SkarmoryThePG

I'm fond of the idea of making Placate faster to cast.

Hmm.

Any good picks other than Force Feedback -rech in Rain and Empty and Achilles -res in Pistols that I should be aware of?

Most Dual Pistol attacks have a chance to KB when not using any of the ammo toggles. If I slot a KB slot proc into the attack (say, Force Feedback %-rech), will it have a chance to fire off even using an ammo type?

Ohgodohgodohgod

pleasepleasepleaseplease give us that Praetorian salute emote

_please_

Fist of Annihilation looks bitchin'. There's your reason.

There's too much prestige in the system as is. No sinks. A mid-size SG can earn more prestige than they'll ever be able to spend way too fast.

Because I hate Fury.

Figures. Art lead just -has- to design his own face character.

Ah keed, ah keed!

It'd require new code, no doubt. For example, the "level-locking" of the trainer so you couldn't train yourself.

Yadda yadda yadda here's a suggestion I had a while ago:

Mentor: Your experience lets you train other heroes.

Use this power to summon a temporary Trainer. It works just as a normal trainer, with full options, however. The trainer is spawned at your character level, and can only be interacted with by characters at a level lower than your own.

Duration: Permanent until you move away from it.

If you still care for them, posted my Poison suggestions.

40ft is considered 'ranged', not 'melee'. 39- is non-ranged.

Icy for example I know is 4/4/1. Thorny is 4/3/2

I’ll try and avoid being my usual overly verbose self. Success not guaranteed. Apologies in advance in order.

The primary purpose of this proposal is not to make Poison more powerful. It is to make it more appealing. The primary means under consideration are changes to underwhelming powers and the addition of an ability the set completely lacks, that is, alpha strike mitigation.

Alpha strike mitigation (ASM) is a catch-all term meaning a powerset’s ability to reduce the incoming damage delivered by a spawn’s opening salvo. Note that this can very well mean up to every attack a mob has used once. Compared to other Buff/Debuff powersets, Poison has virtually no ASM at all. Weakening a target will not be significant when facing a big and/or uniform spawn, Neurotoxic Breath offers good beta strike mitigation but not really significant ASM (due to the hold being unreliable and very short; at best, it just delays the alpha strike by seconds), while Noxious Gas has very low uptime, and its method of delivery makes it unlikely that the debuff will be applied before the bullets start flying.

A common complaint about Poison is that it’s “Radiation Emission, but weaker”. Indeed, there is currently not all that much reason to pick Poison over Rad’s slightly weaker but AoE debuffs backed by the very desirable AM buff. Part of this suggestion is an attempt to distance Poison from Radiation Emission in the name of unique appeal.

Changes to powers:

Alkaloid
Alkaloid, not without reason, has a reputation as one of the two worst single target heals in the game, only considered not worse than O2 Boost because it is available to a quarter of the archetypes, trading the latter’s stun protection and resistances to highly annoying debuffs (endurance and perception) for a extremely situational toxic resistance. Alkaloid’s already low HPE is exacerbated by its availability only to endurance-inefficient Masterminds and its almost 50% faster than others (not counting Arcanatime) animation. The fact Poison masterminds start with this power doesn’t help its perceptions.

A simple buff of the heal value to Heal Other/Soothe/Cauterize levels could work, however, it would only further homogenize the set. My suggestion is as follows: Reduce the duration of the resistance buff to 15s, perhaps remove it entirely. Keep the heal and the cost at the same level. However, add a strong Heal over Time component for the duration. Possibly as strong, or stronger, than the “burst” heal at the start. This would make the power weaker than Heal Other at burst healing, but if allowed to fully apply, the heal per casting will be noticeably higher. The HoT should, rather obviously, not stack, rather refresh, increasing HPS at a noticeable cost to HPE.

A similar effect could be achieved by a strong but limited duration +regen effect, however, my experience suggests that would prove a veritable nightmare to balance. 25% of a mob’s life over, say, 15s is imperceptibly small for a Minion class henchman, but utterly devastating if applied to a Archvillian class mob. Possible ways to abuse this are left as an exercise to the reader. It is my belief that burst +regen should be reserved for self-heal powers, like Energize or Instant Healing.

Elixir of Life
Pretty much a clone of Mutation, with the added drawback of a short but powerful hold at expiration. It is my belief that this should be made the main drawback, and the resulting debuff should be reduced in potency.

Paralytic Poison
A simple, straight-up hold, with no secondary effect. It is my belief that the power should be moved up to Tier 8 (lvl 35), and receive such a secondary effect, in the manner of some non-crippling debuff. Finding a fitting debuff may be difficult, as the set already covers every one imaginable, however, a straight-up -dam seems fitting with the toxic theme. Alternately, the power could add a toxic DoT, however that would throw off slotting and not really fit the ‘paralytic’ descriptor.

Poison Trap
It is my belief that this power should be taken out behind the barn, shot, shot again for good measure, buried in an unmarked grave, and spread over with salt just to be sure. No cottage rule, no excuses. Just gone. The only thing this power does well is ruin the name of Traps’ Poison Trap.

Pestilent Cloud - NEW POWER
Sliding into Tier Seven, this power is meant to give Poison a degree of ASM. The character launches a sizeable glob of poison gunk, either by baseball pitch or Shout’s slow spit animation. The power itself is a Patch about the size of Tar Patch, and it has three discrete effects:

Firstly, any mob that passes through the patch has its damage debuffed some. This effect persists a few seconds after leaving the area.
Secondly, any mob caught in the initial blast has a high chance (actually two independent chances) to be afflicted by a damage-less sleep.
Finally, the cloud pulses out an often but low (Earthquake mechanic) chance to place a sleep on any mobs that remain in its area of effect.

The Pestilent Cloud would play a role similar to Fearsome Stare. Control the enemies who you don’t shoot, debuff the offense of those you do.

Noxious Gas
While no doubt an awesome power, it is in fact, Too Awesome To Use due to its low uptime. This may be personal bias speaking, but I propose something radical: Turn it into a toggle. Keep the recharge low enough that being detoggled/turning it off to save end won’t cripple your efficiency for the next spawn or two, keep the cost high enough that you have to work for it to not worry about keeping it up (think Disruption Field... though hopefully no higher, even for a Mastermind). This’ll give Poison characters a clear, reliable goal of a power to aspire to unleash upon their unworthy foes.

Plus, if the set ever gets proliferated to Corruptors, this power might work just as well on your teammates...

This concludes this suggestion. Comments? Questions? Opinions? Death treaths?